Piercing a wood, and skirting a narrow and natural causeway Under the rocky wall that hedges the bed of the streamlet, Rounded a craggy point, and saw on a sudden before them

Slabs of rock, and a tiny beach, and perfection of water, Picture-like beauty, seclusion sublime, and the goddess of bathing.

There they bathed, of course, and

Arthur, the glory of headers, Leapt from the ledges with Hope, he twenty feet, he thirty; There, overbold, great Hobbes from a ten-foot height descended, Prone, as a quadruped, prone with hands and feet protending; There in the sparkling champagne, ecstatic, they shrieked and shouted.

66

'Hobbes's gutter," the Piper entitles the spot, profanely, Hope "the Glory" would have, after Arthur, the glory of headers:

But, for before they departed, in shy and fugitive reflex

Here in the eddies and there did the splendor of Jupiter glim

Was set, and, visible for many a mile,

The cottage windows through the twilight blazed,

I heeded not the summons: happy time

It was indeed for all of us; for me It was a time of rapture. Clear and loud

The village clock tolled six. I wheel'd about,

Proud and exulting, like an untired horse

That cares not for its home. All shod with steel,

We hiss'd along the polish'd ice in games

Confederate, imitative of the chase And woodland pleasures, the resounding horn,

The pack loud-bellowing, and the hunted hare.

So through the darkness and the cold we flew,

And not a voice was idle: with the

din

Meanwhile the precipices rang aloud; The leafless trees and every icy

Crag

Tingled like iron; while the distant hills

Into the tumult sent an alien sound Of melancholy, not unnoticed, while the stars,

Eastward, were sparkling clear, and in the west

The orange sky of evening died away.

Not seldom from the uproar I retired Into a silent bay, or sportively Glanced sideway, leaving the tumultuous throng,

To cut across the image of a star That gleam'd upon the ice; and oftentimes,

When we had given our bodies to

the wind,

And all the shadowy banks on either side

Came sweeping through the darkness, spinning still

The rapid line of motion, then at

once

FULL knee-deep lies the winter snow,

And the winter winds are weari-
ly sighing:

Toll ye the church-bell sad and slow,
And tread softly, and speak low,
For the old year lies a-dying.

Old year, you must not die;
You came to us so readily,
You lived with us so steadily,
Old year, you shall not die.

He lieth still: he doth not move:
He will not see the dawn of day.
He hath no other life above.

He gave me a friend, and a true true-love,

And the New-year will take 'em

away.

Old year, you must not go;

So long as you, have been with

us,

Such joy as you have seen with

us,

Old year, you shall not go.

He frothed his bumpers to the

brim;

A jollier year we shall not see.
But though his eyes are waxing dim,
And though his foes speak ill of him,
He was a friend to me.

Old year, you shall not die;
We did so laugh and cry with you,
I've half a mind to die with you,
Old year, if you must die.

He was full of joke and jest;
But all his merry quips are o'er:
To see him die, across the waste
His son and heir doth ride post-
haste;

But he'll be dead before.

Every one for his own.

The night is starry and cold, my
friend,

And the New-year blithe and
bold, my friend,
Comes up to take his own.

How hard he breathes! over the

snow

I heard just now the crowing cock.
The shadows flicker to and fro;
The cricket chirps; the light burns
low:

'Tis nearly twelve o'clock.

Shake hands, before you die.
Old year, we'll dearly rue for
you:

What is it we can do for you?
Speak out before you die."

His face is growing sharp and thin.
Alack! our friend is gone.
Close up his eyes: tie up his chin:
Step from the corpse, and let him in
That standeth there alone,

And waiteth at the door.
There's a new foot on the floor,
my friend,

And a new face at the door, my
friend,

A new face at the door.

TENNYSON.

THE RIVULET.

AND I shall sleep; and on thy side,
As ages after ages glide,
Children their early sports shall try,
And pass to hoary age, and die.
But thou, unchanged from year to
year,

Gayly shalt play and glitter here: